TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran has sentenced three men to death for being involved in the fatal bombing of a mosque that killed 14 Iranians in the southern city of Shiraz in April, the hardline Kayhan newspaper reported on Saturday.

Iran has accused the United States, Britain and Israel of being behind the blast that also injured 200 others.

Haidarifar, who previously accused the three of being sent on a mission by Israeli intelligence services to carry out assassinations and military sabotage in Iran, did not say when the verdict was issued.

"A Tehran Revolutionary court has found the three guilty as 'mohareb' (one who wages war against God) and 'corrupt on the earth'," Kayhan newspaper quoted Haidarifar as saying.

Under Iranian law, all execution orders must be upheld by Iran's Supreme Court.

"After their verdicts being upheld by the Supreme Court, the three will be hanged in Shiraz," he added.

A little-known Iranian Sunni Muslim dissident group made a claim it was behind the blast on a website in June. Iran is overwhelmingly Shi'ite.

The death sentences follow the early November execution of an Iranian businessman convicted of spying on the military for Israel, the Islamic Republic's arch foe.

A further four people have been charged over the Shiraz blast and will be tried in the near future, said Haidarifar.

Tension between Iran and Israel have been running high in recent months amid speculation the Jewish state might attack Iranian nuclear facilities which it believes form part of a covert weapons programme.

Iran rejects the accusation and says it would retaliate for any military strikes launched by Israel, believed to be the only Middle Eastern country with nuclear arms, or the United States.

Last week, Haidarifar said the three had confessed in the hearing at a Revolutionary court, adding they had plans to carry out other bombings in the Islamic state.

Iran said on Monday its elite Revolutionary Guards had broken up an alleged Israeli-linked network and the prosecutor's office has requested from the court the punishment of execution for all members of "the spy network."

(Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Sophie Hares)

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JERUSALEM (AP) - Weakening international pressure on Iran will embolden Tehran to make major strides next year toward developing a nuclear bomb, according to assessments from Israeli intelligence officials obtained Monday by The Associated Press.Delays in activating Iran's nuclear reactor will not hold up its development of nuclear weapons, because Tehran's main focus is enriching uranium, the officials said. The intelligence officials agreed to be interviewed only on condition of anonymity because the information is classified.Israel considers Iran to be its greatest threat and dismisses Tehran's insistence that its nuclear program is meant for peaceful purposes.Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad repeatedly has called for Israel's destruction, and his country already possesses missiles potentially capable of delivering a nuclear warhead as far as Israel.Israeli leaders say they favor a diplomatic solution to the West's standoff with Iran over its nuclear program, but three rounds of U.N. sanctions on Tehran have not succeeded in pressuring it to stop enriching uranium. Efforts to impose a fourth round of sanctions have been stymied.While championing diplomacy, Israel has not ruled out a military strike.Israel's National Security Council, which gathers intelligence from a variety of sources, including the military, is in the process of putting together its annual assessment of the Iranian threat. The Haaretz newspaper, citing a draft of that report, which is to be submitted in January, reported Sunday that the council recommends that Israel work on its military strike option while working «discreetly on a scenario of Israel's having to contend with a nuclear Iran.Officials at the National Security Council, prime minister's office and foreign ministry would not comment on the Haaretz report.Last month, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak told visiting U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that all options were open to get Tehran to abandon its nuclear ambitions. Although Barak did not say so specifically, one of those options could include a military strike.For all that, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert hinted recently that Israel would not be able to go it alone, as it did in 1981 when it sent warplanes to destroy Iraq's unfinished nuclear reactor.Talk of a unilateral Israeli strike is «part of our delusions of grandeur,» Olmert said in an interview.

Iran has scattered its nuclear facilities across the country, building some in heavily fortified, underground bunkers.The intelligence officials recently presented their conclusions to Defense Minister Ehud Barak and plan to deliver their assessment to U.S. President-elect Barack Obama shortly after he takes office in late January.On Monday, the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Israel's former military commander, Moshe Yaalon, as saying the West must consider all options to stop Tehran's nuclear program, including assassinating Ahmadinejad. A Yaalon spokesman said he was misquoted and his remarks were taken out of context.Yaalon is considered to be a leading candidate to become Israel's defense minister if Benjamin Netanyahu's hawkish Likud Party wins Feb. 10 parliamentary election

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A new report compiled by American experts and addressed to president-elect Barack Obama contains recommendations on the region, including Iran and Hamas, which might raise eyebrows in Jerusalem's security establishment.

Slideshow: Pictures of the week The next US president will need to pursue a new strategic framework for advancing American interests in the Middle East, says a new report entitled "Restoring the Balance - A Middle East Strategy for the Next President" published Tuesday and compiled over a period of 18 months.

The report cites sectarian conflict in Iraq, Iran's race to build a nuclear weapon, failing Palestinian and Lebanese governments, a dormant peace process between Israel and the Palestinians and the ongoing war against terror as the issues Obama will have to face.

Following an overview chapter by Richard N. Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, and Martin Indyk, director of the Saban Center, individual chapters address the Arab-Israeli conflict, counterterrorism, Iran, Iraq, political and economic development, and nuclear proliferation.

The chapter devoted to Iran calls on the new administration to open multilateral dialogue between the US and Iran on all outstanding issues. Diplomacy, the report says, should begin immediately at a low level, even before the Iranian elections in June 2009, so that the US can better understand the Iranian hierarchy and political dynamic.

The chapter also calls on the US to view Iran as one united nation, ruled by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - a recommendation that goes against the strategy of trying to leverage inter-Iranian discord in order to effect regime change from within, without direct external intervention.

The report says Iran is two to three years away from being capable of militarizing its nuclear program, and this time is seen as sufficient for the US to adopt an updated diplomatic approach to prevent such a move from Teheran.

Intelligence assessments in Israel conflict with the American estimate, saying Iran might get the bomb as early as sometime in 2009.

The most problematic recommendation in the chapter devoted to Iran from an Israeli point of view, however, is an assessment that resorting to a military option is likely not to produce results worthy of the effort invested and that one of the many scenarios the US should prepare itself for is the reality of a nuclearized Islamic Republic.

Iran might use nuclear weapons as a strategic point of leverage for threatening its neighbors without actually firing them.

On the Palestinians, the writers, Shibley Telhami and Steven Cook, suggest that the US encourage Palestinian unity, because any diplomatic initiative will produce no results unless there is one political address on the Palestinian side.

The report suggests that the US work with its allies in the Middle East so that Hamas will be incorporated into the Palestinian Authority in the framework of a unity government.

Furthermore, the report suggests the US should force Israel to freeze building of new settlements, including stopping further construction in existing settlement blocs.

The report is expected to be a centerpiece of the Saban Forum discussions, held in Washington this weekend.

Outgoing US President George W. Bush will speak at the forum's opening evening and the forum will include former secretary of state Henry Kissinger, former British PM and current Quartet envoy in the region Tony Blair, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Deputy Prime Minister Haim Ramon.

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If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? m.of v. w.shaka speare

bush did the heavy lifting...the heavy handed "wrangler politique" was necessary and you are simply too stupid to see that genocide is a problem which must be handled with a mighty thunder of force sometimes...now the usa has security foothold back in the middle east some fine allies in kurdistan and mesopoetamia and we have leverage to deal with the dangerous theocracy of persia...

iran rests in our sights...diplomacy is our option and their option now that they are in a corner...they are worried israel may go rogue...and we should be too...

glad you see that your dove selling was a fruitless bit of stupidity as well...nothing accomplished from you hypocrites...

quack quack...

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If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? m.of v. w.shaka speare

stv...thanx f brnch...bush offensive politique has set the stage for some maneuvering...foundations need some time...good one, stv...txt m lter...

Scholars outline progress, missteps towards peace

American, Israeli, and Saudi in talk at Princeton forum

THE THREE DIPLOMAT-scholars who came together at Princeton University on Dec. 3 to discuss the prospects for Middle East peace bring to the table broad experience in the diplomatic, political, and academic worlds.

Prince Turki al Faisal is the former Saudi Arabian ambassador to the United States and the former director-general of Al Mukhabarat Al A’amah, Saudi Arabia’s foreign intelligence agency.

The youngest son of the late King Faisal, he is a nephew of the current King Abdullah. He was a 1968 classmate of President Bill Clinton at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. He also studied Islamic law and jurisprudence at Princeton and Cambridge universities and the University of London.

Itamar Rabinovich was Israel’s chief negotiator with Syria under former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. He served as Israel’s ambassador in Washington from 1993 to 1996.

A former president of Tel Aviv University, where he now occupies the Yona and Dina Ettinger Chair in Contemporary History of the Middle East, Rabinovich is a senior research fellow at TAU’s Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies.

Daniel Kurtzer served as U.S. ambassador to Egypt from 1997 to 2001, to Israel from 2001 to 2005. The Israeli daily Ha’aretz has reported that President-elect Barack Obama may appoint him as a special envoy to the Middle East.by Marilyn SilversteinNJJN Bureau Chief/PMB

December 11, 2008

Three noted scholar-diplomats — one Saudi Arabian, one Israeli, one American — sat down together at Princeton University on Dec. 3 to take the measure of the Middle East conflict.

All three saw a region ripe for change, and an incoming American president poised to shepherd a peace process. And while they differed on who remains the greatest hindrance to progress, they agreed that there are initiatives in place that point to a possible resolution.

The program brought together Prince Turki al Faisal, chair of the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh; Itamar Rabinovich, visiting professor of public policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government; and Daniel Kurtzer, Princeton’s inaugural S. Daniel Abraham Visiting Professor in Middle East Policy Studies.

More than 250 people filled Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs for the discussion — The Middle East at a Crossroads.

This past year, while Israelis celebrated the 60th anniversary of their state, Palestinians mourned what they call Al Naqba — “the Catastrophe” — said al Faisal, who once attended the Lawrenceville School, just a few miles down the road from where he stood.

“For six decades, so much blood has been spilled without concrete results, that the prospect of peace is nothing but a shimmering mirage,” he said. “Whatever else one believes, it is universally agreed that the Palestinian people are occupied and have been deprived of the rights to their land.”

Al Faisal outlined progress and missteps on the road to peace.

“The Oslo Accords of 1993 were a significant turning point in the conflict,” he said. “But the peace enshrined in the Oslo Accords did not materialize. Alas, the assassination of [Israeli Prime Minister] Yitzhak Rabin by a Jewish terrorist brought to an end this most hopeful development for peace.

“After the assassination of Rabin, Israel used Oslo as a cover under which to appropriate more land — especially around Jerusalem,” he said. “Israel’s negotiating strategy kept at arm’s length any negotiation on final-status issues…which is the key to a lasting and secure peace.”

Al Faisal continued his litany of failed efforts at achieving peace — the 2002 plan of the “Quartet” — the United States, Russia, the European Union, and the UN — the Road Map in 2003, and, on the Arab side, the Fahd Plan of 1981 and the Saudi-led initiative of 2002.

“Alas, here we are at the end of 2008, and peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians is still far off,” al Faisal said. “It is clear that the new American administration will have to continue the efforts of this one. The road to peace is clear. However, walking it will take a great deal of effort on the part of Israel.”

At the heart of the Arab initiatives for peace, al Faisal said, are demands that Israel withdraw to its 1967 borders, accept a just solution to the refugee problem, and recognize an independent state of Palestine with “East Jerusalem” as its capital.

“We demand that Israelis and Palestinians eschew violence,” he said. “We demand that Israel stop the destruction of homes, the uprooting of olive trees, the indiscriminate imprisonment of Palestinians, the construction of the apartheid wall.

“We demand the Palestinians use all measures to stop suicide bombers and missile attacks, and that they release the Israeli soldier [Gilad] Shalit. All of these points can be executed at the same time, without delay.

“This work will require all of our patience and determination,” he said. “It will not be easy. It will take tough negotiations and empathy, but these efforts will be worth it.”

Rabinovich said he welcomed al Faisal’s positive approach, but disagreed with his historical narrative. He said that although there was much to be lauded in Saudi Arabia’s initiative, it came two years too late to provide former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat with the support he needed in order to make concessions on Jerusalem and final-status issues.

Rabinovich also noted that al Faisal had overlooked the roles of Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Lebanon.

“They are all in the Middle East, and they are all the foci of problems,” he said. “We need to take a comprehensive view of Middle East problems as we look forward with the hope and expectation of resolving this conflict.”

Rabinovich noted that Syria is Iran’s most important ally in the region, and that it forms a land bridge over which Iran can directly connect with Hizbullah, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad. He deplored the Bush administration’s early move to abolish the office of the Middle East special coordinator. And he recalled that outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had been elected in 2006 on a platform calling for Israel’s disengagement from the Palestinian territories.

“It never worked out,” he said, “but remember that a party was elected in 2006 in Israel on that platform.”

Al Faisal’s presence at the Princeton forum was a sign that the entire region is ready for change, Rabinovich observed. He called upon President-elect Barack Obama to begin to deal with the issues by the spring of next year — not only by adapting the road map, the Quartet’s plan, and the Saudi initiative, but also by beginning a series of confidence-building measures after the Israeli elections on Feb. 10.

“As the United States takes the lead, the Arab world, hopefully led by Saudi Arabia, needs to come forward with ideas and support — the kind of support that was not there in 2000,” he said. “This should take us to a new beginning that will be very helpful.”

Growing pressuresKurtzer, who has been serving as an adviser to Obama on Middle East issues, pointed to additional challenges facing the region — growing poverty, a widening gap between rich and poor, lack of upward mobility, a population explosion, the strain on social services, the susceptibility of Arab youths to the appeal of religious extremists, and, in Israel, the systematic and growing lawlessness of the settler movement.

As the sides come together to grapple with these issues, Kurtzer said, “I suggest we spend far more time listening to each other than preaching to each other. Today is a good example.”

The recent American election signaled a desire for the kind of leadership that can effect transformational change, he added.

“The Middle East is crying out today for such leadership — both in the region and in Washington,” he said. “The first place to start is the Middle East peace process. It’s time to stop catering to vocal minorities in the region on both sides who strive for a winner-take-all, zero-sum outcome.”

The building blocks and diplomatic tools to accomplish this are already in place, Kurtzer said. He noted that Obama has pledged to activate a Middle East peace initiative at the outset of his term and that the upcoming Israeli elections will give Israelis the opportunity to demand a policy change from their leaders.

“It is time also for Arabs to tell their leaders to activate the [peace] initiative and to support progress in the tough negotiations that need to take place,” Kurtzer said. “I do not pretend it will be easy. I do insist that it is possible and it is urgent.

“The resolution of the Arab-Israeli problem will not resolve the endemic problems of the region,” he said. “But it is quite possible to believe that Middle Easterners can begin to develop solutions to these problems, and to stand up and challenge their leadership to get to work on problems that seemed to be impervious to change — and then to change them.”

Sponsors of the program, in addition to the Woodrow Wilson School, were the university’s Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, the Carolyn L. Drucker Memorial Fund, the Department and Program in Near Eastern Studies, the Transregional Institute, the Center for Jewish Life, and the Perelman Institute for Judaic Studies of the Program in Judaic Studies.

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If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? m.of v. w.shaka speare